


Leader On A Leash

by mr-finch (soubriquet)



Category: Lost
Genre: Blow Jobs, Exhibitionism, M/M, Masturbation, Threesome - M/M/M, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-08-08
Updated: 2012-08-15
Packaged: 2017-11-11 17:19:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/480969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soubriquet/pseuds/mr-finch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not something he's ever considered, not once in this place he's dubbed Purgatory.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It's not something he's ever considered, not once in this place he's dubbed Purgatory. His time with Jacob has been long, erratic, never repetitive, but at least most of his work has been simple: live among the people, encourage their growth and advise them. Defer to the current leader and watch for the next. The tasks he has been set to do are abnormal only in the mythical sense, at once familiar yet profoundly uncertain, so when John Locke hisses "Richard" in his ear, he thinks that it must be a warning.

Not an invitation. Not as solid a demand as the hand on the back of his neck pulling (not dragging) him onto his feet and past the fire that signals their camp, towards a felled log just on the brink of the circle. He can see the shape of a person sat on the other side, back to them, and keeps his hands up in unvoiced protest as John guides him around. 

It's Ben, and the way that those wide open eyes find his as Linus half-turns where he's sitting is enough to wake Richard up fully. There's something there that sets him on edge, though he couldn't name it, not with the brief glance he's allotted before John Locke releases him and Ben glances away. 

"Well?" John prompts, to the man sat with his knees barely a foot away.

Linus doesn't say anything, and Richard opens his mouth to ask them what on earth is going on, but then Locke moves into his peripheral vision, standing to the side and yet somehow _over_ Ben, and he waits for it instead.

"You had something to say."

The look Ben gives Locke could forge daggers; Richard knows it well, but he had never seen Ben quite so hateful quite so often until John arrived. He doesn't think Ben will answer, but he knows that while the man loathes to swallow it, he'll bow to the Island just as willingly when it's required of him. Now, it seems, is once of those times.

"What- John would have me say isn't very-" Finally, Ben meets his eyes. "Well it isn't very _expected_ , Richard, and I know how long you usually have to prepare." His hands are clasped together in his lap; Richard only notices this now because he moves them, runs a thumb over a knuckle, shifts his wrists, probably because he hopes the lack of light will mean they can't make out his discomfort. Whatever it is, Linus doesn't like this situation.

"You couldn't do this?" He sounds disgusted, tossing the barb at Locke, but Locke just mildly shakes his head in that impassive way of his, and when Linus goes to rise, Locke pushes him gently back down. Like most of John's interactions with Ben, he's brief, stern, but calm. Knowing that he'll get his own way in the end. He reminds Richard of Ben if Ben wasn't so conflicted; struggling to contain himself rather than against his own confinement. 

Linus shoots another stare at Locke, before exhaling in frustration, and moving back to Richard, but in that look there's that unnameable thing again, and this time he thinks he almost has it- "Richard come here," Ben says, running the sentence together, and Richard is bending his knee to the ground before he can even process that it was an order.

Ben leans forward, almost entirely a silhouette but lit with the firelight running off of his former advisor's body, and grasps the sides of Richard's face in a dry, hot grip. It's light enough for him to pull away if he wanted to, but he tilts his face into it willingly, a question curling in his throat and none of the courage to ask it. 

"Will you do what I say?" 

He wasn't expecting a question in return, so it throws him. With his thought patterns stuttering along and comprehension brought down to the level of instinct, the most he can do is nod, nod with his face in Ben's hands, and it seems to satisfy him. 

In some unnatural, tumultuous other universe, Richard's heart forgets to beat when Ben pulls him closer.

The words rustle this close to his ear, leaning on the sibilants, but it's not enough to hide what he's saying. If anything, it makes Richard listen harder.

Linus pauses before he speaks, then continues in his usual dry tone as if it's not lowered and this isn't an errant situation. "Locke wants me to kiss you." He doesn't pull away then, but the interlude feels more like a meaningful look than a falter. "I suggest you do it."

Richard's murmuring "Of course," into Ben's neck before the other man even draws back and pulls them together, letting himself into Richard's mouth in spite of the shuddered breathing that seems to be all Richard's capable of. Out of the corner of his eye he's vaguely aware than Locke has sat down somewhere along the log and is watching them; he also finds that he doesn't care. Ben is full of heat in all the points where they're connected, hot enough to be blood under his skin over firelight, and in some brief moment of clarity, Richard stops letting it happen and turns his head to get a better angle, forcing Linus back. 

The man actually inhales so quickly it's almost a hiss, but Richard cuts it off with his mouth. He gets a hand around to the small of Ben's back and shoves them together, but it's not near enough with the tree in the way. Rather than bother too much about logistics, he wraps both arms around the guy and semi-lifts him back onto the ground. With Ben's legs either side of Richard's hips and his back against the log, there's much better reach.

He didn't intend to get so far, but it's not like he has no encouragement. All the noises Ben makes into his mouth and against his skin when he pulls away, the way one hand curls into the back of Richard's hair and the other at his collar, semi-possessive, but never total. No, Ben Linus is never totally in charge. All of this can't be fake, not completely.

For a moment he wonders how Ben can be so passionate about somebody but never say a thing, quite unlike his own experience with Isabella where he could hardly _stop_ talking. This could've been a simple, dry, closed-mouth affair, but Linus never intended that; it's quite clear. His intentions are partially influenced, he assumes, by Locke, but this isn't petty vengeance, it's passion. And come to think of it, what is Locke even doing-

Hand on the back of his neck. Again. Richard's getting tired of being manhandled.

John clears his throat and Ben's eyes snap open, jumping away from close contact. "Ah-" he begins, still eyeing John, as if he's just been reminded of something. "Well, there _is_ one more thing."

"Which is?" Richard says it perhaps harder than he intends to, a little strained by the constant switches in the situation. It gets Ben to look at him, though, which is something. 

"I want you to fuck him," says John, quietly, from behind. At Richard's silence, he adds: "I could get him ready for you if you like."

There's another indescribable look on Linus's face, and it's difficult, but if Richard were to put it into words he'd say they had likely done it before. It's another revelation. One that leaves him digging bitten nails into the back of Ben's shirt. His voice comes out coarse, scattered. "Why are you doing this?"

John kneels down, level with Richard's shoulder. He even lets go of his neck, but compassion isn't exactly forthcoming right now. "Because he deserves it," he says, letting that sink in, "And because you need it."


	2. Chapter 2

Too much thought dedicated to working out what Locke could mean is far too much thought for right now. Richard doesn’t like how little control he has over the situation - even less than usual, with both leader and ex-leader knowing so much more than him.

“What-” he begins, but John interrupts as if his time to decide has already run out.

“Ben.” 

Locke gets up, sidling around Richard and taking Ben’s old place on the log. Linus seems somewhat uncomfortable to be practically between his legs, and Richard’s not quite sure whether he’s decided on ‘stunned’ yet himself or still stuck on ‘horrified’. 

“I’ve seen the way you look at me, Richard.” Out of the blue, John’s addressing him. As Ben turns to look, faintly cringing but mostly confident, over his shoulder, Richard follows his line of sight. Locke looks casual, calm and impassive as ever, as if every word he’s ever said has been repeated countless times in the past. It’s infuriating, and for a moment, Richard thinks wildly that John must mean lust or attraction, somehow, and had mistaken him completely. “I want to know why that is. And I think Ben would like to know, too.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Richard replies, his eyes hot, but they follow Ben as the guy moves with deliberate touches from John - there, on his left shoulder to turn him, there, on the inside of his right to affirm the desire is to turn all of the way around, there, a touch on his jaw for no reason at all.

“Ever since I came back to the island, you’ve been looking at me,” Locke insists. “Like you can’t help yourself.” His left hand drops to curl into Ben’s hair, as the man shifts on Richard’s thighs, casting a quick glance his way before hooking one leg over and turning to face John, on his knees.

Richard is far too close; he shuffles backwards, after a guilty look at the creases Ben’s shirt makes as it flattens against his back. Linus has his hands pressed to John’s knees and John doesn’t seem to be noticing at all - he’s meeting Richard’s gaze, implacably, waiting for an answer, or a reaction maybe.

“That’s because you don’t look _right,_ ” Richard spits, and realises it for himself in the same moment. 

All he gets in response is a slightly raised eyebrow, while in John’s lap Ben is touching, moving. There’s the unmistakable sound of a zipper, and then Ben leans forward, nuzzling down into the space between John’s thighs.

Richard’s cock twitches, and he hates himself. He talks if only to take his mind off it, though he can’t take his eyes off of it. “You’re _wrong,_ you’re dead, you can’t be here.”

“But I am,” John says, then eases forward and shrugs down his pants, as if it’s nothing. Ben makes a noise in the back of his throat, waits until John sits back down and Richard can’t see - _he wants to see_ \- but he just knows that Ben is mouthing at him through the fabric. “So, Richard, what does that tell you?”

It takes him a moment, long enough to hear the soft sound of Ben’s lips dragging across a waistband, long enough to realise that he himself has one hand on the ground between his legs and has been unconsciously grinding himself against it. He freezes, hoping it hadn’t been too obvious, and Locke is _still_ looking at him, waiting for his answer. Richard intends to be curt, but his intentions aren’t really working out right now, and instead his voice deepens and almost dies when he responds, “You’re not him.”

When Ben rolls down Locke’s briefs and takes him into his mouth, Richard sees Jacob, bucking gently into the mouth of his constant servant. Jacob in Locke’s body - and Locke had said he’d wanted Ben to know, so that meant Ben didn’t know, and yet here he was doing this for him.

It makes Richard want to kill him. His hands are actually curling into claws, about to spring at them both, before John’s mouth quirks and he slowly shakes his head. It doesn’t soothe his anger, only buffers it as if that motion were a shield between them. “Then what _are_ you?”

But just then, Linus does something with his tongue that makes John close his eyes and inhale. Richard’s attention is drawn inexorably to his former leader, legs sprawled in the dirt; he can still taste Ben in the back of his mouth. Against his own better judgement, he grips the taught fabric of his pants and pulls it away from his skin, as much as it will go, trying to get some space. 

It’s not enough, and he can’t stop himself from rubbing against the shape of his arousal beneath his pants on the way back up. Ben is on his knees and making noises, and John is looking at him as if to say, “Why not?”

He won’t touch Ben Linus. Not without permission. It may seem as if he’s had a lapse in judgement, though, when the next time he goes to relieve some of the pressure his hand stays where it is and curves around his erection. Just there, moving slightly, teasing himself, although he knows it’s in the dark and barely anyone can see, surely. 

Locke has stopped looking at him so much, curling his fingers deeper into Ben’s hair where it grazes at the stubble, and breathing harder. As if he only needed to prove something to Richard, and once he understood, John could let himself be human. 

Ben: he can’t see him, but he wants to. He remembers the bodily feel of him, the blood so hot under his skin, the rustle of his breath in Richard’s ear. He’s not thinking when he raises himself up a little so that he can free himself, deliberately not thinking about the way they’re both on their knees before John, like servants. 

When he gets his cock in his hand, it’s like all bets are off. He’s kneeling in the dark, but feels the heated rush of shame flood through him all the same, gripping himself loosely but submerging fully in the sounds around him. John isn’t speaking but he can hear him anyway, feel his gaze right on him, as if this is all some fucking test and he’s doing well at it.

Ben’s fingers clench painfully into John’s thigh - that’s what he sees when his eyes flicker open. John is tensed on the brink, and his other hand reaches for Ben’s, as his thumb locks down onto the back and he matches the grip around the rest of his thigh with his own hand. His teeth open slightly and Locke pants in little hisses of air as he comes, straight into Linus’s mouth.

It makes Richard’s cock throb as he watches, out of a selfish satisfaction at seeing their implacable leader brought down by such a mortal response. Ben glances upward when John opens his eyes, but the guy just stares evenly down at him and Linus swallows, pulling away from his cock with a low, wet sound.

That’s when he turns to look at him. 

Richard almost overbalances - would have, if he didn’t have one hand planted on the ground in between his knees, the other being of course, the cause of his instability. The heat of admonishment courses through his cheeks, beneath his eyes. He tries to suppress a shudder.

But Ben isn’t turning away, and as far as Richard can make out he’s not disgusted. There’s no noise of surprise, nor an intake of breath. Rather than strike him or reprimand him verbally, Linus just brushes the back of his hand across his lips and looks straight at him. “What are you waiting for, Richard?”


End file.
